Be Well CST, LLC

CranioSacral Therapy (CST) is a gentle light-touch form of hands-on therapy that can relieve your body of pain, illness, and malaise. CranioSacral Therapy can release tensions deep in the body, so that your body can be resilient, strong and resist disease naturally. The therapist assists your body to address deeper tensions by paying specific attention to tension within the dura mater. Dura mater means hard mother. Dura mater is a strong, tough, fibrous membrane; it is the outermost layer that surrounds the brain and spinal cord. This tough membrane attaches to the inside of the cranium / skull and to the sacrum / tailbone.

The membranes, soft tissues, bones and fluid that surround the brain and spinal cord make up the CranioSacral system. The dura mater membrane is the house for your central nervous system. Like the electricity and plumbing that run through your home, “all the nerves and blood vessels going to and from the brain and spinal cord pass through the dura mater. Just as power lines being down can cause loss of electricity disrupting your entire house. Any abnormal tension in the membrane, which puts pressure on the nerves, can disrupt the functioning of the central nervous system and in turn can affect the entire body sometimes causing pain, illness, and malaise. The CranioSacral system has a strong influence over your health and well-being because it controls the internal environment in which the brain and spinal cord operate.

“Tension within the dura mater is detected primarily by means of its effect upon the tiny rhythmic motion of the bones of the skull and the tailbone to which the dura is attached. William Sutherland, DO in the early 1900s, first recognized the motion of these bones. Dr. Sutherland developed many techniques for releasing compression in the cranial bones and founded the field of Cranial Osteopathy. More recently, CranioSacral Therapy has been developed and refined by John Upledger, DO."

Cerebrospinal fluid surrounds the brain and spinal cord. Your amazing body carefully regulates the pressure of the cerebrospinal fluid, “keeping it within narrow limits, the pressure rises and falls rhythmically every 6 to 12 seconds. We call this rhythm the CranioSacral rhythm. The CranioSacral rhythm can be palpated anywhere on the body and is the assessment tool that forms the basis of CranioSacral Therapy. By paying close attention to this rhythm, CranioSacral therapists are able to locate restrictions and areas of abnormal tension, and facilitate their release. In effect, the CranioSacral therapist works on the body from the core outwards, rather than starting at the periphery and working in.” 


Who Receives CranioSacral Therapy?

CranioSacral Therapy is a great form of therapy for infants through adult. Because it is a light-touch, nonintrusive form of therapy people of all ages can benefit. It improves general well-being and is a great form of therapy for people in all stages of health well-being, from the very ill to the fit and healthy who need to de-stress and stay on top of their game.

CranioSacral Therapy can be useful in treating a wide variety of conditions, ranging from back pain to the after effects of meningitis and encephalitis. It is especially effective for treating headaches and chronic pain. Upledger has found that 80 to 85% of resistant long-term headache patients respond favorably to CranioSacral Therapy. In most of these cases, he has found that once the CranioSacral system is functioning properly and the headaches are gone, they do not return.

CranioSacral Therapy is the preferred treatment for certain types of endogenous depression (depression for which there is no apparent cause). Often people with this type of depression will exhibit simultaneous compression of the tailbone onto the lowest lumbar vertebrae, compression of the skull onto the neck, and compression of a key joint within the skull itself. Relieving all three areas of compression simultaneously will often immediately alleviate the depression.

Newborns often experience trauma during birth, either from a long and difficult labor, from having their head hyper-extended upon the neck during delivery, or as a result of rapid decompression if they are delivered by C-section. This may result in compression of one or more of the bones of the skull or induce a torsion within the dura mater tube surrounding the spinal cord. Such children may exhibit a variety of problems such as colic and digestive difficulties, learning disabilities such as dyslexia (difficulty reading) or dyscalcula (difficulty doing math), hyperactivity, scoliosis, or in severe cases seizures or cerebral palsy. CranioSacral Therapy has been shown to be quite effective at treating such disorders provided the fault lies within the craniosacral system. Upledger reports being able to help 70% of children with dyslexia and between 50 and 60% of children who are hyperactive. Upledger believes that routine CranioSacral evaluation and treatment of newborns could reduce the incidence of brain dysfunctions in children by at least 50 percent.

A partial and by no means complete list of conditions for which CranioSacral Therapy has been shown to be helpful, often in conjunction with other forms of treatment, includes TMJ problems, multiple sclerosis, spinal cord injuries, acute local and systemic infections, high fever, osteo and rheumatoid arthritis, cerebral ischemic episodes (small strokes), ear problems such as tinnitus, and some visual disturbances. The degree to which the therapy is effective in any given case depends largely on the extent to which the problem involves the craniosacral system.

In CranioSacral Therapy the practitioner is an assistant to the body. Acting as a facilitator, by tuning into subtle patterns of tension within the client's body and assisting the body towards release. CranioSacral Therapy is a light-touch therapy, in most cases 5 grams of pressure is used to facilitate wellness. 5 grams is the equivalent weight of a nickel. A universal response of any living organism to pressure is to tense up and guard. By working very lightly and being very patient, the CranioSacral therapist is able to stay below the threshold at which this guarding response occurs and facilitate permanent change.

You should wear loose comfortable clothing to your session. The therapist can begin your session by lightly palpating, using energy, and other gentle methods to assess the tension patterns in your body. Typically they will start at your feet and work up to the head. When the therapist locates the primary areas of restriction, they will work on gently releasing the tissue. Many times the principal area of restriction will not be the area in which the client feels the pain or dysfunction, you may be surprised when, for example, your headache or neck pain eases as the therapist works on your tailbone, leg, ankle, or foot.

CranioSacral Therapy is very relaxing and you may even fall asleep on the table. Part of the therapeutic process seems to be getting the conscious mind out of the way so the body can release its tension. It is good to note that that cranial work is never done when the session is over and to expect that the body will continue to release over the next few days.

Dr. Upledger has written several excellent books on CranioSacral Therapy. I recommend the following: “Lessons Out of School”, “Your Inner Physician and You”, “Working Wonders: Changing Lives with CranioSacral Therapy”
In addition, a list of reference articles on CranioSacral Therapy can be obtained from the Upledger Institute in Palm Beach Gardens, Florida, by calling 1-800-233-5880.


Who Can Perform CranioSacral Therapy?

There are several people in Vancouver who do CranioSacral Therapy. You can find a practitioner in the Vancouver / Portland area on The Upledger Institute website http://upledger.com/. In general, CranioSacral Therapy can be done by anyone that has had the proper training and has an appropriate health care license. This includes medical doctors (MDs), osteopathic physicians, chiropractors, naturopathic physicians, acupuncturists, dentists, registered nurses, physical and occupational therapists, and massage therapists, among others. I received my training through the Upledger Institute, Palm Beach, Florida. 

 

• $50 for a 25 minute CranioSacral weekly / bi monthly maintenance session
• $100 a 50 minute CranioSacral initial / core treatment session
• $125 a 60 minute CranioSacral and Flexibility resilience session
• $150 a 90 minute CranioSacral and Flexibility rejuvenation and resilience session